A very merry Christmas

Our time on Coconut Beach was absolutely lovely. I’m very dissapointed Laura wouldn’t allow a photo of her basket weaving as it was actually quite impressive I think. The food was amazing throughout, and we had great fun with the other 4 guests on the island. As we headed over on the 10 minute speedboat to Blue Lagoon I think we were slightly wary as it’s such a big place comparatively, but we had nothing to worry about. It’s absolutely lovely here.

The Yasawa Flyer, our transport around the islands

As it’s Christmas we splashed out and upgraded our room to a Garden Villa which was an inspired decision. The room was lovely with another big outdoor shower and our own hammock (an important inclusion in any Fiji accommodation.) The island is certainly bigger and busier, but with that comes a lot of benefits. Meal times are much more flexible, and there’s a choice of food. There’s a full activiities board, including yoga twice a day for Laura. There’s even a proper dive shop, which allowed us to get a quick refresher before going on our first dive for 5 years. Fortunately it all came back to us, and once we managed to get equailized we had a great little dive (hopefully the first of a few this trip.)

On our first night we teamed up with some other people to take part in “Suvivor Fiji”, which was effectively a pub quiz with lots of Fiji questions. Having been in last place after the first round we rallied and ended up winning a champagne breakfast! However as we were all diving the next day we had the champagne on the evening instead. Very nice way to start the trip.

The water here really is stunning, a deep, beautiful turqoise with great visibility. The resort has its own great coral teeming with sealife. Their beach is beautiful and stretches far and really isn’t ever busy. I really don’t think there’s anywhere prettier to spend Christmas.

Xmas Schedule

We were really interested to see what would be done for Xmas out here. Would it be like any other day? The answer is an emphatic no! They really went all out. The day started out with 2 little presents on our doorstep (a couple of wooden turtles) followed by breakfast where we were repeatedly warned to save ourselves for lunch due to the sheer amount of food. And they weren’t wrong! After a morning of snorkling and kayaking (we managed to kayak without falling out with each other,) we sat down to a feast. They’d rearranged the tables into two long communal ones,with a big array of starters to share such as sausage rolls, mozarella balls and a bunch of other bits (see the menu picture below). For main we had litereally everything. Fish, lamb, beef, pork and Turkey, steamed veg, salad and much more. However, there was no gravy which let the whole affair down, but it was still very tasty and the deserts went some way to compensating. I could easily have collapsed into a sugar coma following brownie, chocolate mouse, some pink cake which tastes of pure sugar (amazing!) and Jelly Beans. Whilst it’s not a patch on home cooking it was more than we ever expected from a remote Fijian island. To top it all off, there was even a full three course evening meal as well which we managed to battle through!

Nom Nom Nom

Christmas Kayaking

As if all the decorations and food weren’t enough, we were treated to a visit from Scuba Santa who paddles in in full Santa gear, gumboots and all, along with a scuba tank. He must have been roasting! It was definitely Santa too, not Jeff from the dive shop dressed up. He handed out sweets to everyone and took lots of photos before heading back off to give presents out around the world.

The authentic Scuba Santa

Today is boxing day and we’re sad to go, but our next island awaits after another 2 hours on the boat. I’ll be sitting in the shade this time after burning my legs somewhat last time. And I’ve run out of factor 50 now!